It was an extraploation of roger's post, deb. Obviously people express it in a myriad of ways.

Everyone writes in a different way, but I think it's rather presumptuous to call it block when you don't actually know the reasons why someone prefers not to write in a certain way. Let's not make sweeping judgements!

I dislike freewriting yet I am not blocked, by my subconscious or anything else.

Deb

Well I have to say I don't see Naomi was being judgemental at all - just describing different kinds of "getting blocked" - and I think it is fair enough to say that someone who plans and plans but can't start could be blocking themselves - and probably (I guess) feeling pretty scared and maybe procrastinating. I'm sure we've all done that, haven't we? (Or am I just speaking for myself here? )

I think it is an interesting point she's making too, that one can get blocked as easily by over-planning sometimes as underplanning. (Obviously, everyone works differently.)

I think, for myself, a good balance of planning and freewheeling is the thing. If I overplan I do get blocked - and bored too - and it can come out a bit flat. I think sometimes you can find out about things - your characters, how they interact etc - by writing and producing rubbish for a while before producing the good stuff. It can be more in stages too - you might plan, and then write and the writing makes you go "aha!" and back to the planning. No?

Terry Gilliam says to be a great director is not all about the planning. Yes, you have to do it but if you stick too rigidly to it you miss out on moments of genius you could never have dreamt up beforehand. He says to be a really great director you have to be an opportunist - to recognise what is happening as soon as it is happening and be prepared to capture it then and there so that you have it for later. Obviously film-making is totally different but I thought that was interesting.

You say people who plan but never write aren't blocked they just don't know how - but surely to improve in writing you just have to get on and start and be prepared to produce rubbish and improve. As with anything. You can't improve at the piano without playing the piano, however badly, can you? Similarly I don't think one can improve in writing without getting on and writing. It can't be done theoretically. But, of course, perhaps you weren't saying that, Deb, and I missed the point entirely. In fact, assume I probably have missed the point! Not deliberately. But it's a good discussion anyway.





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Not dissing planning here - not at all. But just suggesting not all of it necessarily take place before writing - but maybe during and then again after draft one etc etc. After all it can sometimes be easier to go "this character is like x y or z. Very deep with emotional scars about a b or c" but it's pretty useless if you can't write that in the end. And you can't always control what you write. I was reading about Melville and how Moby Dick was supposed to be about another character entirely and the whole of the first chapter is about him and then he got fed up and killed him off and it turned out to be about someone else altogether who he was obviously more interested in - although maybe he didn't realise this before he started writing.

You say people who plan but never write aren't blocked they just don't know how

I didn't say that was why, I said that could be why. I have no objection to Naomi pointing out that block could be a reason why people have trouble with writing their plans, or trouble with writing a chapter from a one-word trigger - I was disagreeing with her suggestion that that is the reason. She said:

In both cases there must be a subconscious block.

If she'd said 'in both cases there could be a subconscious block' I wouldn't have even replied, because I'd have agreed. But that difference in words is, IMO, a big difference.

Deb

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Sorry to be persistant on that point, but I do worry about the trend for misrepresenting what others have said, then disagreeing with it. I actually think it's the reason for many of the tiffs online - not just on WW but on forums in general. If we're going to say something then I think we should try to be accurate - after all, WWers are writers. And if we're going to pick up on something someone else says, especially if we're going to dispute it, it makes sense to be sure we've taken in what they actually said, and so argue against what they said and not what we fondly imagine they said.

That isn't aimed at you, Snowy. I'm talking generally.

Deb,

i think it is a shame that all posts have to be reduced to lawyeristic wrangling. I think THAT is the problem with WW. I think we need a bit more leeway when we look at people's post. It seemed obvious to me that Naomi was not saying "100 percent of the time" or whatever and she was making an interesting point that is then killed stone dead by interpreted it thus. Similarly I made LOADS of points in my last post that I would have been interested in discussing with you or anyone else and I also said I might have misinterpreted you but I was doing my best to understand and here's some more points and instead all I get is stuff about misinterpreting your post again. We are all just ordinary people on this site talking freely. I just think it is a shame that so often the point gets lost under people saying "actually strictly speaking I said this with a comma inserted here" etc. I was not accusing you of anything, Deb. I was being friendly, so I thought. I was only saying I didn't think Naomi was being judgmental. I don't think talking of blocks is judgmental. In fact I think she was making a point that could have been helpful to a lot of people.

I don't WANT to have conversations like this. I have enough of them with my Dad . It is impossible to be accurate in the way you describe anyway. Why not just suspect the best motives and take the broader view of what people are saying? Whatever generalisation Naomi was making, the POINT she was trying to make has now been lost. And that point was that there can be a similarity between people getting blocked with too much and too little planning. Which I still think is an interesting idea. And it wasn't a mean point, a nasty point or a judgmental point.

Also - you talk of people "misrepresenting" in order to disagree. Perhaps people simply understand it like that and are not trying to do anything vindictive at all. The point you quote me as "misrepresenting" was merely me trying to quickly summarise something I took you to be saying - that people are not blocked but maybe don't know how to write - and then jumping off into a discussion and saying yes, but therefore don't they have to write to learn to write? I don't believe I was highlighting it and going "bollocks" or anything. I was TALKING with you, Deb. DISCUSSING the ideas, because I genuinely thought it was an interesting topic. If you put this proviso that I have to never misunderstand you in any way, we simply can't talk. I do my best to understand your point to discuss things further and you see this as "misrepresenting". All that happens is we can't discuss things then for how else are people to proceed?

I really find this stuff about misrepresenting a bit depressing because why would I be trying to do that? And if you say something that I might possibly understand marginally differently to your intention, then I can't risk talking to you in case you get offended? Just say - no no, what I meant was A B or C or something. How else are we even supposed to know if we are totally getting the other person's point if we are never allowed to find out?

And before you say "aha I covered myself by saying not you - it was a general statement" - that doesn't help because that is was the answer I received to my post and the reason you give for going on about this point.

But, look, I don't want a quarrel if it sounds like I do. I wanted to say this because i think it is tiring the way it keeps happening. That interesting discussions get reduced to wrangling over commas. Perhaps we just have to be prepared to reiterate what we meant if someone gets the wrong end of the stick and assume not everyone is out to deliberately twist our meanings. And I will reiterate again - I was not attacking you in any way in my post, merely saying I didn't think Naomi was being judgmental and then burbling off about some of the issues that interested me in a way that I hoped added to the general discussion. To which I didn't get much back. Which was sad.


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Just wanted to add, in case you don't realise ;) I really do enjoy discussing stuff with you. And in general for that matter. I just get frustrated if the threads become mere dissections of each others posts (or worse dissections of our OWN posts - i hate it when I start going "right" and highlighting my own words to prove whatever it was - which is merely about winning and nothing to do with anything very interesting. ) It tends to make the threads circular and stall rather than engaging with the points being made (even if in doing so we inadvertantly get it wrong occasionally) in order to move the discussion onwards to areas we haven't thought about before.

You're a person I enjoy talking with because you do have points to make and things to say.

Dare I put another toe in the water here?

All I was saying is there has been found to be a block between the subconscious decision and the conscious action.
Deb is right that the underlying cause of that block could be anything, and different things could be employed to unblock it. At the risk of going round in circles, I was mearly making the point that the block was between the subconscious and the conscious, as opposed to between the conscious and the hand, or between hand and eye. It explains that, however much conscious effort one puts in to unblocking the flow of words, it may be a complete waste of time.
As someone who has suffered from writers block I find it an interesting exercise to try to work out cause and effect.
Perhaps it expalins why some writers sought to unblock the flow of words by resorting to class A drugs and alcohol - to break down that wall between them and their subconcious.
Maybe I should just write down my dreams - assuming I could remember them in the morning


- NaomiM

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Apologies, since people dislike absolutes ;)
...there has been found... should be '...it is inferred..',

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PPS. Feel free to disagree. :)

Naomi, I'd agree from my own experience that it's accessing that place where creative stuff comes from that can be hard - and I'm sure it's true that drugs/alcohol etc. are often recruited. There's a WWer who only works with the curtains closed and the electric light on, others who work in bed, or first thing in the morning before they've woken up properly, or very late at night, or kick off with 15 minutes free writing, or meditation/yoga, or loud music... They're all about in some way making it easier to get at that creative place - that right-brain, simultaneous, non-rational, laterally-thinking place - and cut off anything that hinders you from getting at it. Maybe the people who have to tidy first aren't procrastinating, but are using a different kind of rhythmic, not-difficult physical activity to detach from the clamorous left-brain activity the outside world demands. I think the reason so many of us work to music is about this too: it's the mental equivalent of drawing the curtains.

I think one of the things that complicates this question is that 'block' sounds so absolute (which is why I tend not to use the word) whereas most creative artists would tell you that there are lots of degrees of stuckness on the spectrum, from complete block when you write one word in an hour and spend the next hour beating yourself up for only producing one word and a crap one at that at one end, to total flow where you're hardly conscious of the day or time. Whether that flow results in reams of mad, wonderful stuff that will need revising later, or simply one perfect paragraph, isn't the point, and depends on the writer. The point is that for that length of time the whole of you was writing.

Emma

Yup, placing yourself in that comfort zone from whence you can write is a many and varied thing.
Personally I think the block - for want of a better word - was caused by a subconcious desire to get back to childrens fiction, which is my comfort zone. Or, maybe it was just procrastination at being presented with a task that seemed insurmountable at the time.

Block, block, block, block, block.... A bit like saying Voldermort, isn't it But I'm sure it's not catching or cursed.


- NaomiM

Interesting. So there's a physical comfort zone, which helps, but other sorts of comfort zone perhaps don't.

I do also have a technical comfort zone, I think: kinds of writing I know I can do, things about pacing and structure that come easily, types of characters that grow without trouble. On the other hand the only thing that makes me get off my bum and start a new novel is the challenge of moving outside my technical comfort zone.

I do sometimes free-write if I can't see where to take a story or a character, and I know that I often often come up against things I really don't want to deal with which are more to do with me than with the novel. It's frightening to find I'm outside my emotional comfort zone. But I think staying within too small an emotional comfort zone is probably, in the long term, inimical to really good writing. If there are too many danger areas you're not free to let things develop as they will, which is the core of creativity, however much the editorial, rational brain is needed to shape them into something that communicates.

Emma

Roger...

About the unconscious and conscious minds, and some experiments that have been doing with brain scans. Some guy got people to perform actions, you know, just do stuff, and to register the moment they made the decision to do what they are going to do. The brain scans showed that the brain activity related to that activity started well before the conscious thought was registered, proving that the unconscious, or subconscious, had made the decision first and only let the conscious mind know at the last moment.

I agree, this is really interesting. My degree's in psychology, and certainly neuropsychology was fascinating; if you're interested in reading a bit more about the subject, there's a very good (and light hearted / jargon free) recent book on the subject called "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell. It is a bit American in places perhaps, but well worth a read if you're keen on this area.

All good wishes, Katy

Thanks Katy, I'll see if my local library can get hold of a copy

I think staying within too small an emotional comfort zone is probably, in the long term, inimical to really good writing

Agreed, Emma. Many times I find myself reading a chapter thinking 'stop doing that to the character', but at the same time knowing it would spoil the story if they did.
I have problems putting my characters through the wringer. Death or injury is fine, but sustained bullying is well outside my comfort zone.

- NaomiM

Snowy and Naomi - I'm sorry if I seemed to be being awkward. It wasn't intentional. I think it was simple frustration that some of you seemed to misinterpret what I'd said, but I always knew it was unintentional, and I agree I could have handled it better, so I'm sorry. (My husband said I was awkward last week, so I must have just been having a phase... )

What I was trying to get at was that, yes, some people get blocked, but there are also completely different reasons why people don't or don't want to write in certain ways or methods - such as freewriting, or writing fast. Someone on WW is able to write 4000 ish+ new words per day, which I think is wonderful... but I know I couldn't, just because my creativity does not work that way.

My way of writing is more like that of my ex-boss, who's a journalist, who used to lie on the sofa for hours thinking about a piece he was going to write, and then he'd go to the computer and bang it out really quickly. He planned in his mind before he went to the keyboard.

Deb

No worries, deb. I think people were just trying to get their own, different, points across, rather than disagreeing with any one point in particular.
Such is often the way with forum 'discussions'.

- NaomiM

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I was hoping the topic would move on to comfort zones, and does anyone consciously write outside of their comfort zone for the sake of the story/genre?
Sex is outside my zone, although I can cope with a bit of fumbling and double entendre.

- NaomiM

I never try to write outside my comfort zone, TBH - at least, not yet. I don't much like reading out of my comfort zone these days, either, having done so quite a lot in the past (so I do have that reading experience behind me).

Sex is within my comfort zone - I sometimes fear that anything which doesn't involve sex is outside my comfort zone....

Historical stuff is outside my comfort zone, as is writing about anyone from a culture I am not extremely familiar with. I know you can research these things, but I use inspiration to write (yes, I know it ain't fashionable) and I'm not sure how easily I would get inspiration for scenes too far from my personal experience.

Deb



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BTW, Naomi, thanks for not taking offence.

I think some (all?) of my best writing comes from things that are outside my emotional comfort zone, but then I'm very cautious about putting myself too nakedly into my work, so it's wondering, 'what would it be like if...' for someone else that gets me going. And I think I have to imagine harder to write from the point of view of a man, for example, or a soldier, or a medieval woman, which I suppose you could say is outside my technical comfort zone, but the thrill when you're getting it right is hard to beat. Sex I enjoy writing, mainly (she says, slightly pink) for the technical challenge, because it's so difficult (I nearly said hard, but I won't) to do well. But I also do a mean death-by-septicaemic-battle-wound...

But when you come down to it, it's about the real core stuff of love and loss and happiness and fear and desire and disgust, isn't it. You don't get very far as writer if you can't deal with those, though they may be very uncomfortable indeed, whether you dress them in a houppelande, or a space suit.

Emma